This past Sunday I walked into my family room as my wife was watching the end of the movie Footloose. I don’t think I have ever seen more than 5 consecutive minutes of the film before changing the channel so I was surprised to learn that Sarah Jessica Parker was one of the leading actresses. While this didn’t change my relatively low opinion of the movie, it did start a conversation about the six degrees of separation between Kevin Bacon and every other actor in Hollywood. As I was driving to work the next day, I began to think about all of the different ways that B2B integration supports our modern life. I came to the conclusion that virtually every activity in our day-to-day lives is in some way supported by B2B integration. In this post I would like to introduce a concept called Six Degrees of Separation from B2B.
Six Degrees of Separation
Wikipedia defines Six Degrees of Separation as “The idea that, if a person is one step away from each person they know and two steps away from each person who is known by one of the people they know, then everyone is at most six steps away from any other person on Earth.” Although, the concept of Six Degrees of Separation, became popularized through the Kevin Bacon game, there have actually been studies performed about the links between human relationships since shortly after World War I. Recently, the Six Degrees concept has become a mainstream idea popularized on social networks such as Facebook, movies such as Babel and Crash and TV programs such as LOST and Six Degrees.
Six Degrees of Separation from B2B
In my definition, I am proposing that every activity in your life is no more than six degrees away from a process that is supported by B2B integration. For example, I flew on an airplane today from Chicago to Washington DC, which was secured in part by the use of EDI transmissions from the airliner to TSA. The laptop I am typing on was assembled by Lenovo who ordered the hard drive, memory, microprocessor and other components using B2B e-Commerce. The Diet Pepsi I am drinking was purchased by a merchandising manager responsible for replenishing the Costco stores in Northern Virginia. The electricity and broadband connections I am using to power my laptop are provided by utility and telecommunications companies that use B2B technologies to operate their networks.
Six Degrees is a key tenet of EDInomics, which studies relationships between everyday life activities and B2B integration. In upcoming posts, I will offer more examples of the Six Degrees concept to illustrate relationships you may not know exist. In the meantime I would challenge you to send me an everyday activity you undertake and I will show you how it is fewer than six degrees from B2B…
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